The Jammu and Kashmir Police on Thursday came out with pictures of help it offered to a couple and their newborn baby by escorting them to safety amid stone pelting in northern district of Baramulla.
A police spokesman said the mother and her child were unable to cross a bridge after
being discharged from the district hospital of Baramulla "due to heavy stone pelting on the bridge" by youths.

The police formed a 'protective human shield' around the newborn baby and his parents and provided them safe passage on their way home, the statement said.

"The pelters did not heed to the pleas of the parents as well as the police. The continuous stone-pelting posed a security threat to the child," the official claimed. The statement did not reveal the identity of the parents or the child.

People believe that the move was aimed at presenting a humane face of police in north Kashmir, where it has continuously faced the hostility of stone pelting youths.

The police spokesman gave reference to an earlier incident in 2010 when an 11-day-old ailing infant died after a mob attacked a bus to enforce a shutdown. The year also witnessed the killing of over 110 young men, many of them school students. Police and paramilitary had to resort to firing to control youths throwing stones on anything related to state.